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DEFENCE
Mexe Raft Equipment
Mr. Barry Field : To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what plans he has to update the Mexe raft equipment.
Mr. Sainsbury : There are no plans to modify the design of the Mexeflote equipment currently in service, which adequately meets Army requirements.
RAF
Mr. Tredinnick : To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what aircraft have been ordered by his Department for the RAF since 1979.
Mr. Archie Hamilton : I refer my hon. Friend to table 5 of the "Statement on the Defence Estimates for 1989" (Cm 675-I), published yesterday, which lists all major equipment ordered by my Department since 1979, including aircraft.
RN (Alcohol Consumption)
Mr. Sillars : To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what are the limits placed on the alcohol consumption by ratings on board Royal Navy vessels.
Mr. Neubert : The limits are :
Warrant Officers and Senior Rates
(a) Spirits. An individual's spirit consumption may not exceed an average of one-eighth of a pint a day.
(b) Beer.
(i) Warrant Officers and Chief Petty Officers-- There is no mandatory restrictions on consumption.
(ii) Petty Officers --An individual's daily consumption is not to exceed :
2 pints or 4 12 oz cans when at sea ; in harbour when at four hours notice or less for sea ; on duty in harbour, or required for duty as a watchkeeper.
4 pints or 8 12 oz cans when in harbour not on duty nor required for duty as a watchkeeper.
Junior Rates --Daily consumption of beer is not to exceed 3 12 oz cans.
These are maximum limits and are subject to any further restrictions laid down by commanding officers about the time and operating situation in which alcohol may be consumed.
Recruitment (Coventry)
Mr. Nellist : To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what information he has available as to the annual recruitment rate from Coventry into each of the armed services from 1970 to the latest date ; and if he will break the figures down by service and by the age and gender of recruits.
Mr. Neubert : I will write to the hon. Member.
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WEU (Defence Representations Group)
Mr. Hardy : To ask the Secretary of State for Defence on how many occasions the Defence Representations Group of the Western European Union has met ; and if he will list those who have represented the United Kingdom at those meetings.
Mr. Archie Hamilton : The Defence Representations Group of the Western European Union has met on 11 occasions since its formation in 1987. The United Kingdom has been led by a senior official from the Ministry of Defence (the level has varied from meeting to meeting) supported by other officials from the Ministry of Defence and Foreign and Commonwealth Office.
US Aircraft (Crash)
Sir Michael McNair-Wilson : To ask the Secretary of State for Defence if he will make a statement about the crash of a United States Air Force A10 aircraft at Bank farm, Benwick, on 17 April ; and whether the aircraft was carrying weapons, including bombs.
Mr. Neubert : As I told the hon. Member for Leyton (Mr. Cohen) on 24 April at column 365 an A-10 aircraft crashed on 17 April 1989 during a routine training flight on open farmland one mile south of Benwick, Cambridgeshire. The pilot was killed. The aircraft was equipped with a GAU- 7 anti-tank gun and practice ammunition.
ENVIRONMENT
Toxic Waste
Dr. Thomas : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will instruct Her Majesty's chief inspector of pollution to conduct an immediate evaluation of sites at Moss valley, Wrexham ; Lodmoor country park, Weymouth and Comeston country park, Barry, to ascertain if hazardous toxic industrial wastes have been disposed of safely.
Mrs. Virginia Bottomley : No. The sites in Wales were covered in a study recently carried out by the Welsh Office. This study looked at some 94 sites in Wales which had been reclaimed from old industrial sites. The study, and copies, are available from the Welsh Office. The Lodmoor site is adjacent to an active landfill site operated by Dorset county council. As both the operator of the site and as the waste disposal authority for the area it is its responsibility to ensure that the site is operated properly. According to the information held by Her Majesty's inspectorate of pollution the Lodmoor landfill does not accept toxic industrial wastes.
Mr. Bellingham : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment how much toxic waste was imported into the United Kingdom in 1988.
Mrs. Virginia Bottomley : Information on imports of toxic waste is currently held by the waste disposal authorities. Her Majesty's inspectorate of pollution is in the process of collecting this information centrally. Figures will be available later this year.
Mr. Redmond : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment in how many of the 56 toxic waste disposal
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sites in Doncaster, South Yorkshire, a potential danger from methane gas has been identified ; if he will list them ; and if he will make a statement.Mrs. Virginia Bottomley : Her Majesty's inspectorate of pollution has been carrying out a postal survey of landfill sites which may need gas control measures to be installed or improved. Initially the survey set out to identify sites which may have the potential to give rise to landfill gas. The second phase was to identify sites which are giving off gas and what controls are either in place or are needed. This second phase is still under way and information is still being collected. It is not possible yet to say which particular sites in South Yorkshire are likely to require further action to be taken. Doncaster district council is the responsible waste disposal authority which, together with South Yorkshire hazardous waste unit, should ensure that adequate control measures have been installed in accordance with waste management paper No. 27--guidance recently issued by Her Majesty's inspectorate of pollution.
Football Membership Scheme
Mr. Frank Field : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment (1) whether individuals holding identity cards will be able to check the information stored on the soccer identity card computer system ; (2) what steps he is taking to ensure that information fed into the national computer system on soccer identity cards will not be released to mail order and similar companies ;
(3) what steps he is taking to safeguard information fed into the national computer system on soccer identity cards from being misused.
Mr. Moynihan : The Government intend that members of the scheme and applicants to it should have the full protection of the Data Protection Act 1984. This will be in relation to the collection of information to be held, access to it and the use to which such information is put. Discussions with the data protection registrar on these matters have taken place and will continue as the scheme is drawn up by the football membership authority.
Support Grades
Mr. Sean Hughes : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, with respect to the support grades in his Department (a) what is the number of staff employed, (b) how many vacancies there are and how many of these have existed for over one month and over three months, (c) how many temporary and casual appointments there are and (d) how much overtime was worked by them in London and elsewhere.
Mr. Ridley : The support grades in my Department mainly comprise staff from the messenger, reprographics and paperkeeping groups, cleaners and office keepers. For my Department, including the Property Services Agency, the information as at 1 April 1989 is : (
(a) there were 856 staff in these grades ;
(b) there were 38 vacancies. Nineteen had been vacant for over one month, 13 of them for over three months ;
(c) vacancies were covered by casual staff when they arose. Casual staff are recruited locally and no central record is kept. My Department and the Department of Transport shared common citizenship until 31 March 1989. Average
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overtime worked by the two Departments was 6.4 hours in London headquarters and 1 hours in regional offices. In PSA the average was 3.1 hours in London and 3.6 hours elsewhere.Community Charge
Mr. Allen : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment in which month he expects his consideration of collective local community charge registration and payment statistics to be completed and to be publicly announced.
Mr. Gummer : I shall announce my conclusions as soon as possible.
Mr. Allen : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what indicative figures for the likely level of community charge in the city of Nottingham have been given by his Department over the last two years giving the date and criteria used in each case.
Mr. Gummer : The Department has not published any forecasts of the likely level of community charge in Nottingham. We have published illustrative figures based on reported expenditure levels for 1987-88 and 1988-89 and on local authority responsibilities in those years. These were placed in the Library on 29 June 1987 and 24 June 1988, respectively. Both were accompanied by a full explanation of the assumptions used to produce the figures.
Mr. Nellist : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will list the orders and regulations concerning the implementation of the community charge (a) laid before and agreed to by the House. (b) laid before, but not yet agreed to by the House and (c) yet to be laid before the House giving in each case an outline of the area of implementation affected.
Mr. Gummer [holding answer 2 May 1989] : The following negative resolution instruments concerning the community charge were laid on 17 March 1989 :
1989 No. 438--The Community Charges (Administration and Enforcement) Regulations 1989. These regulations (apart from regulations 4 and 5) came into force on 7 April 1989. Regulations 4 and 5 come into force on 22 May 1989.
1989 No. 439--The Valuation and Community Charge Tribunals Regulations 1989. These regulations (apart for the purposes of regulations 4 to 8 and 11) came into force on 7 April 1989. Regulations 4 to 8 came into force on 1 May 1989.
1989 No. 440--The Valuation and Community Charge Tribunals (Transfer of Jurisdiction) Regulations 1989. These regulations came into force on 1 May 1989.
1989 No. 442--The Personal Community Charge (Exemptions) Order 1989. This order came into force on 7 April 1989.
1989 No. 443--The Personal Community Charge (Students) Regulations 1989. These regulations are coming into force on 1 October 1989. A debate on these regulations is being arranged through the usual channels.
We intend to lay further regulations on the community charge covering cross border information, the form of the community charge demand note, and the information to accompany it, discounts, co-owners and other miscellaneous provisions.
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Ark
Mr. Flynn : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will seek a meeting with the organisers of the new environmentalist group, Ark to discuss environmental matters.
Mrs. Virginia Bottomley : We have no present plans to do so.
Housing Statistics
Mr. Harry Greenway : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, pursuant to his reply to the hon. Member for Ealing, North of 4 April, Official Report, columns 151-2, when he expects the Housing Corporation to supply the information referred to in that answer ; and if he will make a statement.
Mr. Trippier : The Housing Corporation is currently assembling the information needed to answer my hon. Friend's question and expects to respond by Friday 5 May.
Caravan Sites Act
Mr. John Marshall : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what representations have been received about the future of the Caravan Sites Act.
Mr. Trippier : I receive various letters, from hon. Members and the public, about the Act. The Government announced their conclusions on a review of its operation on 6 February 1987.
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Inner-city Developments (Signs)
Mr. Battle : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what is the size of signs erected on inner-city developments promoting the Government's involvement ; how many such signs have been erected ; how much has been spent on erecting the signs ; and for what purpose the signs have been erected.
Mr. Trippier : The Department provides two sizes of signs, 8 ft by 2 ft and 4 ft by 1 ft. Since November 1987, 4,452 signs have been produced at a cost of £15,204 of which 2,864 have been issued to local authorities and other recipients of the Department's financial assistance through the urban programme, derelict land grant, estate action and urban development grant/city grant. Records are not kept of the number and cost of signs erected.
House Building
Mr. Cousins : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will publish a table showing the number of new housing starts in each region in February 1989, and February 1988, together with the percentage change in starts.
Mr. Trippier : Since monthly housebuilding figures are very variable it is advisable to consider data over three-month periods. Housebuilding starts for the regions in England in the three months to February 1989 and the corresponding period a year earlier are given in the table.
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Housebuilding starts in thousands
|December 1987 to February|December 1988 to February|Percentage change
|1988 |1989
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
North |1.6 |2.6 |+68
Yorkshire and Humberside |3.6 |4.2 |+18
East Midlands |4.5 |4.3 |-5
East Anglia |3.5 |3.1 |-10
South East:
Greater London |4.2 |4.0 |-5
Rest of south east |12.5 |12.2 |-3
South West |6.8 |5.8 |-15
West Midlands |4.3 |3.9 |-9
North West |3.9 |4.9 |+24
England |44.9 |45.0 |-
Sites of Special Scientific Interest (Norfolk)
Mr. John Garrett : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment how many sites of special scientific interest in Norfolk have been damaged in the last five years.
Mrs. Virginia Bottomley : I am advised by the Nature Conservancy Council that over the past five years, out of a total of 129 sites of special scientific interest in Norfolk, 23 have sustained some damage to relatively small areas.
Grant-related Expenditure
Mr. Redwood : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what plans he has to make available his Department's publications, "Grant- Related Expenditure 1989-90" and the "Technical Handbook of Grant-Related Expenditure, 1989-90".
Mrs. Virginia Bottomley : My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State will place copies of these documents in
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the Library of the House. Copies have also been sent to every local authority in England, and to the local authority associations.Industrial Chemicals
Mr. Mans : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what plans he has for the systematic evaluation of the possible harmful effects of industrial chemicals.
Mrs. Virginia Bottomley : The Department and the Welsh Office have recently published a consultation paper proposing that additional statutory powers should be introduced to evaluate and control the environmental hazard of existing chemicals. The consultation paper describes the powers available under existing legislation and proposes additional powers to obtain information about substances with the potential to cause environmental damage, to require testing when adequate information
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is not available, and to control the supply, storage or use of such substances when necessary. Interested organisations and individuals are invited to send their views to the Department or the Welsh Office by 15 June 1989.Publicity
Mr. Dobson : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will place in the Library details of each major publicity campaign mounted by his Department in 1985-86 and each successive year, including in each case the objectives of the campaign, the intended audience and the outcome of the monitoring of the achievement of the intended objectives, and national research conducted for him by the Central Office of Information together with a note of the intended objectives in the campaigns in 1989- 90.
Mr. Ridley [holding answer 2 May 1989] : I have today placed in the Library a table showing the major publicity campaigns undertaken by my Department since 1985-86, with intended objectives for all campaigns including those planned for 1989-90. A campaign would be required to publicise the offers of sale of the water authorities ; this is still to be planned.
Tropical Hardwoods
Mr. Dalyell : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will make it his policy to refuse planning permission for landscape work using unrenewable tropical hardwoods.
Mr. Chope [holding answer 2 May 1989] : No. The planning system is not the proper means for regulating the choice and use of materials other than on land-use grounds.
Freemasonry
Mr. Matthew Taylor : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will take steps to ensure that freemasonry does not exert secret influence in local government ; and if he will make a statement.
Mrs. Virginia Bottomley [holding answer 2 May 1989] : The national code of local government conduct contains provisions aimed at such matters. We have set up a working group with the local authority associations to review the code, which will be given statutory status by the Local Government and Housing Bill. This will, no doubt, be one of the problems to be considered by the group.
Crown Suppliers
Mr. Hoyle : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, in relation to the Crown Suppliers' context range of furniture, if he will provide (a) the initial forecast sales, (b) the actual sales since its introduction and (c) the estimated sale value of the amount currently unsold in store.
Mr. Chope [holding answer 21 April 1989] : The Crown Suppliers forecasts of sale for individual ranges are commercially sensitive and therefore confidential. But in the eight months since the range was launched, sales have totalled £0.52 million and negotiations are in hand to sell a further £1 million worth. The estimated sales value of stock currently held in store is £1.6 million.
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Personal Social Services
Ms. Harman : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will publish figures showing the per capita costs, for each shire county and each metropolitan borough, of spending on personal social services, in the year 1987-88.
Mrs. Virginia Bottomley [holding answer, 26 April 1989] : The information based on returns made by local authorities is as follows :
Net current expenditure per capita
on personal social services-
1987-88: London boroughs
|£
-------------------------------------
City of London |386.59
Camden |195.41
Greenwich |139.29
Hackney |214.47
Hammersmith and
Fulham |165.00
Islington |234.32
Kensington and Chelsea |150.86
Lambeth |204.15
Lewisham |180.60
Southwark |190.15
Tower Hamlets |136.03
Wandsworth |151.98
Westminster |185.59
Barking and Dagenham |74.23
Barnet |63.99
Bexley |55.32
Brent |141.95
Bromley |52.46
Croydon |68.72
Ealing |88.26
Enfield |71.07
Haringey |161.87
Harrow |62.99
Havering |57.13
Hillingdon |87.44
Hounslow |91.34
Kingston-upon-Thames |79.67
Merton |80.85
Newham |113.25
Redbridge |63.96
Richmond-upon-Thames |68.26
Sutton |59.24
Waltham Forest |117.01
Net current expenditure per capita
on personal social services-
1987-88: London boroughs
|£
-------------------------------------
City of London |386.59
Camden |195.41
Greenwich |139.29
Hackney |214.47
Hammersmith and
Fulham |165.00
Islington |234.32
Kensington and Chelsea |150.86
Lambeth |204.15
Lewisham |180.60
Southwark |190.15
Tower Hamlets |136.03
Wandsworth |151.98
Westminster |185.59
Barking and Dagenham |74.23
Barnet |63.99
Bexley |55.32
Brent |141.95
Bromley |52.46
Croydon |68.72
Ealing |88.26
Enfield |71.07
Haringey |161.87
Harrow |62.99
Havering |57.13
Hillingdon |87.44
Hounslow |91.34
Kingston-upon-Thames |79.67
Merton |80.85
Newham |113.25
Redbridge |63.96
Richmond-upon-Thames |68.26
Sutton |59.24
Waltham Forest |117.01
Net current expenditure per capita
on personal social services-
1987-88: London boroughs
|£
-------------------------------------
City of London |386.59
Camden |195.41
Greenwich |139.29
Hackney |214.47
Hammersmith and
Fulham |165.00
Islington |234.32
Kensington and Chelsea |150.86
Lambeth |204.15
Lewisham |180.60
Southwark |190.15
Tower Hamlets |136.03
Wandsworth |151.98
Westminster |185.59
Barking and Dagenham |74.23
Barnet |63.99
Bexley |55.32
Brent |141.95
Bromley |52.46
Croydon |68.72
Ealing |88.26
Enfield |71.07
Haringey |161.87
Harrow |62.99
Havering |57.13
Hillingdon |87.44
Hounslow |91.34
Kingston-upon-Thames |79.67
Merton |80.85
Newham |113.25
Redbridge |63.96
Richmond-upon-Thames |68.26
Sutton |59.24
Waltham Forest |117.01
Somerset Levels and Moors
Dr. Cunningham : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what is the total number of (a) lump sum and (b) annual management agreements concluded between the Nature Conservancy Council and owners and occupiers of the area known as the Somerset Levels and Moors, the area of land involved and the total cost of agreements to the end of January 1989in 1989 prices.
Mr. Ridley [holding answer 26 April 1989] : I am advised by the Nature Conservancy Council that 184 agreements have been concluded with owners and
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occupiers of the Somerset Levels and Moors, covering an area of 1, 968 hectares. These provide for annual payments totalling £281,685 per annum, as at January 1989.Dr. Cunningham : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will list those areas in the Somerset Levels and Moors which have been notified as sites of special scientific interest, indicating (a) where the Nature Conservancy Council owns land, and (b) the number of management agreements reached with owners and occupiers of each area so notified.
Mr. Ridley [holding answer 26 April 1989] : The information requested is as follows :
SSSI Name |Number of Agreements
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
West Sedgemoor<1> |24
Tealham and Tadham Moors<1> |35
Southlake Moor<1> |18
Moorlinch<1> |11
King's Sedgemoor |43
Wet Moor |5
West Moor |4
Westhay Moor<1> |1
Catcott, Edington and Chilton Moors<1> |31
North Moor |11
Shapwick Heath<1> |1
Sharpham Moor Plot |-
Street Heath |-
|----
|184
<1> Includes land owned by NCC
North-east Hampshire structure plan
Dr. Cunningham : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment when he proposes to announce his decisions on the proposed alterations to the north-east Hampshire structure plan.
Mr. Ridley [holding answer 26 April 1989] : I will send my proposed modifications to the submitted alteration to Hampshire county council as soon as possible.
Population Movements (South Yorkshire)
Mr. Redmond : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what information he has on the numbers of people who have moved (a) into and (b) out of each district authority area in the county of South Yorkshire in each year since 1979.
Mr. Freeman : I have been asked to reply.
The table gives the numbers moving (a) into and (b) out of each district of the county of South Yorkshire from/to the rest of the United Kingdom, for the years 1979 to 1987. These figures have been derived from the National Health Service central register recording of patient re-registration with doctors involving a change of family practitioner committee.
In preparing population estimates of the district, account is also taken of migration from countries outide the United Kingdom and of the effect of movement of United Kingdom and foreign armed forces. Such flows in each direction are small and only the net effect is estimated using data from various sources.
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Moves into and out of family practitioner committees (districts) in
South Yorkshire
Barnsley Doncaster Rotherham Sheffield
Year |In |Out |In |Out |In |Out |In |Out
----------------------------------------------------------------------
1979 |3,880 |3,880 |6,290 |6,640 |5,770 |5,100 |12,710|14,670
1980 |4,110 |4,010 |6,710 |6,590 |5,570 |5,110 |13,390|14,560
1981 |3,840 |4,040 |5,620 |6,140 |5,100 |5,170 |13,040|13,190
1982 |2,350 |3,600 |5,570 |6,630 |4,640 |5,410 |13,310|13,340
1983 |3,390 |4,480 |5,630 |7,180 |4,700 |5,790 |12,170|14,360
1984 |3,575 |4,346 |6,265 |7,054 |4,941 |5,790 |13,057|14,649
1985 |3,321 |4,548 |5,868 |7,033 |4,666 |5,894 |12,598|15,288
1986 |3,882 |5,219 |6,973 |7,852 |5,713 |6,878 |13,896|17,327
1987 |4,222 |5,166 |7,349 |7,898 |5,782 |6,596 |14,518|16,864
Note: Numbers in the table are National Health Service central
register records of moves into and out of family practitioner
committee areas (conterminous with districts in the county of South
Yorkshire) from rest of the United Kingdom. Data are based on a 10
per cent. sample for the years 1979 to 1983 and a 100 per cent. count
thereafter.
EMPLOYMENT
Training Consultants
Mr. Andrew F. Bennett : To ask the Secretary of State for Employment (1) what percentage of internal training for employees within his Department was carried out by private sector training consultants in each of the last five years ; and what was the cost to his Department in each of those years ;
(2) what percentage of training under his Department's human resources development strategy has been carried out by private sector training consultants ; what private sector companies are involved ; and what fees have been paid by his Department in each case ; (3) if he will list all firms providing training consultancy services for his Department in each of the last five years ; and what fees were paid to each company in each of the years.
Mr. Cope : This information is not collected in the form requested and could be obtained only at disproportionate cost.
Mr. Andrew F. Bennett : To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what method of assessment of quality of service provided is used when his Department awards private sector training consultancies.
Mr. Cope : Quality is assessed by departmental tutors attending training events delivered by training consultants, and by comments and feedback through structured questionnaires completed by trainees and their line managers.
Mr. Andrew F. Bennett : To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what method of tendering is used by his Department when selecting private sector training consultants.
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